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Documentaries can show you things that you didn’t even know you wanted to see. Just about everyone has at one time pretended to rock out on an air guitar (or laughed at somebody else for doing it). But how many people thought it was a competitive sport (we use that term loosely here), with a World Title and everything?
In the small town of Oulu, Finland, the world championships have been happening since the mid 90’s with international champions from all over the globe, but it comes as a shock to Kriston Rucker and Cedric Devitt, that there has never been a representative from the United States. They decided to do something about that by founding the USA Air Guitar Finals.
When it comes to competition (and documentaries about competition), one
thing that kicks it up a notch is a good strong rivalry. This one doesn’t
disappoint - it starts at the East Coast Regionals when we’re first introduced
to Dan Crane, a.k.a. "Bjorn Turoque" and David "C-Diddy"
Jung with his Hello Kitty/ninja outfit and his desire to out weird the
world. They even have a segment where you get to meet these guys "up
close and personal". You think it’s going to all be over when C-Diddy
wins, but when he gets to Los Angeles for the Nationals, there’s Bjorn
Turoque again - having qualified on the West Coast and ready to challenge
C-Diddy once more (persistence or sore loser – you decide).
There’s a training camp sequence, and lots of comparisons to the Olympics
and figure skating – the judging is scored on a 6.0 basis and they even
have a compulsory round (and yes, the categories do include artistic merit
and technical ability). You could call it poetry in motion or the purest
form of performance art, or maybe just plain silly, but according to Bjorn,
"to err is human, to air guitar... divine." (You gotta love the
guy.)
This documentary is hilarious – at times it’s almost too absurd to hear former champ (and hottie) Zac Munro talking about the Zen of airness. But as the competition heats up, you get their desire to be the best in the world at something and you get caught up in the drama (at least we did). By the time the World Championship rolls around, you realize they’re serious about having fun and you’re right there with them. Rock on for world peace!
© 2007 Shadow Distribution - All rights reserved
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